The field of the invention is food processing and the invention relates more particularly to the forming of thin flat foods, such as corn chips or tortillas. Most commonly, such thin sheets of dough are formed on the surface of a rotating sheeter roller and removed by a wire separator which is held against the surface of the roller by a series of plastic bands held in grooves formed in the roller.
There are several disadvantages to the holding of a separator wire by plastic bands. One difficulty is that the wire quite often breaks which shuts down production, thereby increasing the cost of production. U.S. Pat. No. 5,720,990 discusses a process for reducing the frequency of breaks in the wire, but, of course, such process does not completely eliminate such breaks and the process also increases the amount of wire used. Another shortcoming of the use of bands to hold a separator wire against a roller surface is that the width of the bands cannot be used for food products and instead the dough over the bands is carried around the roller to be reprocessed, thereby reducing the amount of sheeted product that can be produced by 10-20%.
Experimental attempts have been made to support a blade externally of the roller to eliminate the bands and the wire but such attempts have been unsuccessful. A buildup of dough has occurred on the upper surface of the blade which dough occasionally falls off. This creates an undesirable particle of dough which falls in with the desirable food product, such as corn chips. It should be noted that corn dough or masa is much more difficult to remove from a roller than wheat flour as it is relatively sticky and does not hold together as well as dough made from wheat flour.